


The Edge of the World

by Vera (Vera_DragonMuse)



Category: The Hobbit (2012)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-14
Updated: 2013-04-14
Packaged: 2017-12-08 10:39:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/760421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vera_DragonMuse/pseuds/Vera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sky is weeping already. It’s a good time for sad stories.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Edge of the World

**Author's Note:**

> For my very very dear Bettiebloodshed. Without you, there would be far fewer stories. A happy early birthday, my dear, and many many amazing returns.

The storm howled by the room’s lone window, rattling the pane and streaking rain over the glass. Inside the fire sputtered on wet wood and two boys twisted themselves deeper into the pile of blankets. Their weapons leaned against the door, sword and bow cut for young hands. The cabin was only meant to act as a temporary way station for hunters too far out to make it home for the night, but it was dry and they were grateful for the smoky fire. 

“Tell me a story.” Kili demanded, already half-asleep, head lolling against his brother’s shoulder. 

“You’ve heard all of my stories.” Fili drew Kili closer, shivering still in his damp underthings. 

“All the adventure ones. You must have others.” 

“It’s late. You should sleep.” 

“A story would help.” 

“No one would know you’re nearly grown when you act like this.” 

“I don’t want to be grown, so that works out. Come on, Fi. One story.” 

“There is one I’ve never told you.” He pressed his hand over Kili’s heart, felt the faint thump of it against his palm. “It’s sad though.” 

“The sky is weeping already. It’s a good time for sad stories.” 

“There was a man who lived at the edge of the world,” Fili began and he could imagine the sweep of the ocean they’d never seen, “and he wanted to see what lay beyond it. So he gathered wood and shaved it down day by day until he had planks and a mast and joints. With his own hands over two long years, he built a handsome ship. As he worked, it seemed to him that the ship took on a life of its own. It told the man where the next plank should go, how to curve the prow and where they should first sail from.” 

“Bossy ship.” Kili smiled. 

“It knew better than its master what needed to be done.” Fili dropped a kiss on the crown of Kili’s head. “From the first day at sea, the man knew that though he had never before sailed, his ship would guide him wherever he needed to go. They went on many adventurers and sometimes they had passengers, but often it was just the two of them. The man slept on the ships smooth deck and he ate sheltered in its cabins. He cried bitter tears onto its rails when he felt sad and let his laughter ring over the prow when he was glad. 

“Sometimes, in his dreams, the ship came to him as another man. Tall and graceful and lean. They would talk of sea things: the movement of waves and the conversation of dolphins. The ship would kiss the man’s brow before it left. When the man woke from those dreams, he would press his lips to the ship’s prow, just in case there was truth in them.” 

“I like that.” Kili leaned back, offering up his own mouth for a kiss which Fili gave readily. “Go on.” 

“There was a storm.” Fili shifted, resettling Kili’s weight against him. “The man and the ship had gone too far from the shores they knew well. Everything was in darkness and the wind tore at them. The man kept his hands on the wheel, gripping so hard that his hands bled, but there was no use in it. They were taken by the largest waves they’d ever seen, carried many miles battered and broken. At last, they crashed against the rocks and the man was thrown from the ship and into darkness. When he woke again, the storm had ended, but the damages were beyond reckoning. 

“He stood alone on the smallest of islands without shelter and only a very small spring of fresh water. The ship, once so handsome and proud, had been dashed against the rocks beyond hope of repair. The man wept and gathered the few pieces of the ship he could to make a rough lean-to, piling the rest on the rocks. It was freezing cold and he had flint in his pocket. Though he knew what he had to do if he had any hope of survival, it took him three nights to work up the courage to do it. 

“At last when he thought he might die of the cold, he set fire to the ship’s wood. It almost refused to light, so damp had it become in the storm. Perhaps it wouldn’t have taken at all, but even those few planks remembered the man’s touch and accepted the licks of flame. The man grew thin and thirsty, waiting for rescue and with every fresh plank he put to his fire, his heart and hope died a little more.” 

“And then what?” Kili prodded when Fili fell silent. 

“There is no more. The wood ran out. The ship was dead and the man along with it.” Fili pulled a blanket further around them. 

“Who told you such a story?” Kili demanded. 

“I don’t remember. I read it somewhere.” Rubbing his hands over Kili’s arms, Fili generated a little more heat between them. “I told you it was sad.” 

“I know, but...still. There must be something more. What’s the point of such a story?” 

“That we can live and love and then we perish.” 

“But there is something more after we die.” When Fili didn’t answer, Kili turned in his arms. There was a solemn look on Fili’s face that he didn’t much like. “You do believe we go somewhere after we die, don’t you? You believe in Mahal and the Great Rebuilding.” 

“I don’t know what I believe.” Fili shrugged. “Perhaps there’s only death and then we know no more.” 

“Do you know what I think?” Kili’s warm breath lapped over Fili’s lips. “I think that the story doesn’t end there.” 

“Oh? And how would you end it?” 

“When the last tiny flame devoured the last splinter of the ship, the man let out a last breath and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he lay no longer on rock, but on a long white beach.” Kili smiled faintly. “Beside him crouched a beautiful man, tall and lean. ‘Come with me’, he said and the man clasped an outreached hand. They walked together down the beach and into a green wood while sun rose swiftly above them.”

“That is a much better ending.” Fili touched his lips to the edge of Kili’s smile. “Are you still cold?” 

“A little.” 

Outside the rain fell on and they found other ways to keep off the chill. 

It was not so many years later under far fairer skies that they set their feet to path out of Hobbiton. They still young and brimming with affection for each other. The hardships that befell their party along the road did little to dim their spirits. Often at night they sang the old songs and told each other all the stories they’d ever known, repeated and embellished. But never again did they speak of the ship and the man. It was a silent story, coming of age with every step they took toward Erebor. 

“Are you frightened?” Kili asked in the dawn hush before the great battle. 

“Yes.” Fili reached for Kili’s hand. “You?” 

“No.” Their fingers shook against each other. “Because we’re going to win, so I can crown you in silver. I found a circlet among the treasures, worthy of an heir apparent. Tomorrow I’ll set it on you and we’ll make love in a river of gold.” 

Grey clouds moved over the battlefield. In the distance, a dull thud rolled outward. Perhaps thunder. Or the thick beat of a goblin war drum. All around them, the others were drawing on armor and sharpening blades. They stood alone, an island of two. Even that small eddy of calm could not last and soon they were drawn away to don chainmail and plate. Fili thrust home his swords into new sheaths as Kili counted arrows. 

They were not new to battle, but nor were they seasoned. The great wave of enemies pressed down upon them, angry and terrible. After the first few moments, Fili lost track of anything, but slashing and hacking. Hilts grew slick with blood and he clung to them with a new sort of desperation. The sun crawled across the sky and still the numbers against them seemed undiminished. Every muscle hurt and when he took in a breath, a sharp lance of pain pierced through him. 

“Thorin!” A wrenched cry cut through the air, unmistakably Kili. Without thought, Fili loosened a ragged whistle and heard the answering call to his left. A trick they had used while hunting in the woods, the perfect mimic of a sparrow’s thin cry. 

It took time, too much time, to fight his way to his brother’s side. Kili stood in front of Thorin’s prone body, too few arrows left in his quiver and a wickedly curved blade, unfamiliar and distinctly goblin, in his right hand. 

“A stab to his stomach, cut through the armor as if it were nothing.” Kili shuddered. “If we keep them back, perhaps we can drag him back behind the front lines.” 

“Aye.” Fili lifted his blades. He stood in the loose battle ready stance that Thorin himself had set his body to remember. “We can do that.” 

There was no more time for talk. No time to wipe the sweat and grime from Kili’s forehead where it must drip into his eyes or brush a hand to his wrist. A troll rose before them, flanked by six goblins chittering and groaning. Drawing on his remaining strength, Fili tore the troll to pieces. He hacked open its gut and took it’s heart through its ribs. He felt the air shiver near his cheek, an arrow loosened into a goblin that might have gotten the better of him. 

Heartened, he went in to the next wave with bared teeth and the fight singing in his veins. With vicious brutality, he speared several of them at one time. His sword stuck into a spine and it took a hard tug to loosen it. He stumbled, a single lost moment. Nothing. A heartbeat. A breath. 

The thin slice of time where a remarkable amount became clear. The sun streaming through the clouds, the wild call of a wood elf, the bright copper smell stinging in his nose. The last thing he saw before the pain crashed over him was Kili, a streak of blood on one cheek and the fletch of an arrow against the other. 

“Thank you.” He told no one at all. Mahal perhaps or whatever shining god Gandalf drew his power from. Sinking to his knees, he shuttered his eyes. He didn’t want to know anymore. If he could die with Kili emblazoned on his eyelids then that would be enough. 

A hand tangled into his hair, pulling back his head. He waited for a final blow, but it didn’t come. 

“Wait for me.” It was Kili, voice pitched to high. Pain. Fili reached out, but his hands, his body was no longer his to control. “When you reach that white shore. We’ll walk together though those woods.” 

Water, hot and too thick, splattered over Fili’s cheek. 

“Don’t cry.” He croaked. “Please, don’t cry.” 

“I’m not.” Kili choked. “Do you hear me? You wait. I’ll be right behind you.” 

“No. Stay” He couldn’t breath, there was no air left. No light, no sound. A fleeting pressure settled over his chest. Too heavy. 

Then nothing at all. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Except. 

It wasn’t quite black. There was something nearly silver about the darkness. Reflective. 

A silver glass, wavering and splintering, refracting an invisible light that dazzled him. When his sight had cleared, all had gone white. His feet were bare and there was grit below them. A hand to his brow, he shielded his eyes.

The ocean stretched out before him, impossible in its vastness. He had never seen the like before. When he had spoken of it, he thought of a lake only wider and rougher. This was nothing like a lake. The waves rolled in and pulled at the sand under his soles. When he leaned down, water pooled into his palm. When he touched his tongue to it, salt stung his mouth. 

“I told you.” Kili knelt down beside him. He was dressed for a summer hunt, a lattice of braids plaiting his hair away from his face. Wedding braids. 

“No.” Fili reached out, cupped Kili’s chin. 

“We’ve crashed, love. Stranded.” Standing slowly, Kili reached out. “There’s a forest to explore now.” 

“How did you know?” Fili put his hand in Kili’s and got to his feet. “None of this was in the stories.” 

“No story you knew.” As they walked, the forest resolved before them. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” 

“You weren’t ready to hear it.” 

“And now?” 

“There was a man who lived at the end of the world,” Kili wound his arm around Fili’s waist and pressed a kiss to his temple. “and he wanted to know what lay beyond it. So he built a ship, plank by plank, joint by joint and as he put it together, he fell in love.” 

“I know that story.” Fili protested. 

“Do you?” Kili took another step and the sand gave way to lush grass. “Then how does it end?” 

“I...I don’t know.” He halted under the golden sun and in the soft breeze. The sky was crystalline. Yet, he could swear he felt the first droplets of rain on his cheeks. “Kili.” 

“Yes?” 

“Tell me a story.”


End file.
